Cardano Foundation spins out digital identity firm Veridian

The Cardano Foundation has spun out Veridian as an independent digital identity company after three years of development, with its shares tokenized on Cardano and plans to seek investors in 2027.

Summary

• Veridian's shares have been tokenized under Switzerland's DLT Act using Cardano's CIP-0113 programmable token standard.
• CEO Thomas A. Mayfield will lead the company's government, enterprise, and AI agent identity business.
• Veridian plans to seek strategic partners and investors in 2027 to support expansion, including in the United States.
• The company says it has mapped all 142 requirements in Utah's state-endorsed digital identity implementation guide.

The Cardano Foundation, in an announcement dated Oct. 8, said Veridian will operate as an independent commercial business led by Thomas A. Mayfield. According to the release, the company will provide tools for governments, organizations and individuals to verify the identity and authority of participants in digital interactions without relying on a central identity database.

Alongside the corporate separation, the Foundation said Veridian's shares have been issued as ledger-based securities under Switzerland's DLT Act. The release describes them as the first asset deployed on Cardano using the new CIP-0113 programmable token standard, developed by the Foundation and the Cardano community.

Cardano tokenizes Veridian's shares under its new standard

The share issuance uses a framework that the Foundation announced was live on Cardano's mainnet on Oct. 7. As crypto.news previously reported, the programmable token rollout allows issuers to attach identity checks, transfer restrictions, and other selected controls to assets created under the standard.

According to the CIP-0113 specification, programmable tokens require a successful script check before ownership can change. The specification lists regulated stablecoins and tokenized securities among its intended uses, with support for approved-address lists and know-your-customer requirements.

The Foundation said the framework uses existing Cardano capabilities and required no hard fork. Under the specification, individual issuers choose the rules for their programmable assets; the framework does not automatically apply those controls to ADA or ordinary native tokens.

For Veridian's next commercial stage, the announcement sets out a 2027 plan to seek strategic partners and investors. According to the company, investment would support its U.S. government business, enterprise operations in Europe, growing issuer network in Asia-Pacific and development of tools that verify AI agents' authority.

The release also names Foundation CEO Frederik Gregaard as Veridian's chair. According to the announcement, Gregaard and the Foundation's chief legal officer, Nicolas Jacquemart, have joined the company's board.

Veridian's U.S. plans focus on state identity requirements

In the United States, the company said it intends to serve demand from state governments for digital identity systems controlled by the people using them. The release identifies Utah's State-Endorsed Digital Identity legislation, SB 275, as a central part of that market.

According to the Foundation's announcement, Utah became the first U.S. state to pass SEDI legislation in 2026, requiring privacy-preserving identity under individual control. The release says more than ten other states are observing Utah's model.

Veridian said it has mapped all 142 requirements in the state's SEDI implementation guide. The company places that work alongside its planned U.S. expansion, while the announcement describes European enterprises and Asia-Pacific credential issuers as additional parts of its business.

To explain the need for identity verification, the release cites Javelin Strategy & Research's estimate that identity fraud cost U.S. consumers $27.3 billion in 2025. The Foundation also argues that centralized identity systems expose personal information to copying and sharing without the consent of the people concerned.

For government and business users, Mayfield described Veridian's service as a way to check credentials and withdraw them when authority changes:

"Veridian gives every person, organisation and agent a credential that can be verified instantly and revoked just as fast, with no central database to compromise."

Veridian's identity wallet predates the commercial spinout

The Foundation first introduced Veridian as an open-source platform in April 2025, according to earlier coverage of its digital identity launch. At the time, the Foundation described a system for individuals and organizations to manage credentials, with an optional trust layer on Cardano.

In its original product announcement, the Foundation said Veridian Wallet lets users manage private keys, identifiers, and credentials. The same announcement described testing environments for developers and enterprise teams to experiment with credential management and verification tools.

According to the spinout release, the wallet is live on both iOS and Android. The company says its platform uses KERI and ACDC, open identity standards that the announcement describes as already recognized by regulators.

The release names chief technology officer Fergal O'Connor as a maintainer of the core KERI and ACDC libraries. Mayfield, meanwhile, said the team spent three years developing the business inside the Foundation before establishing it independently.

Gregaard said the commercial separation gives Veridian "the independence to move at the speed its market demands." He added that the organizations will continue working together, including on bringing verifiable identity natively to Cardano.

AI payment agents already use Veridian's verification tools

Beyond human identity, the Foundation's announcement identifies AI systems executing payments, stablecoin transfers and trades as another use for Veridian. Mayfield said verifying who is acting online becomes more pressing when software moves money and data on someone else's behalf.

According to the release, Masumi, the Cardano-based AI agent payment and identity network developed by Serviceplan Group and NMKR, already uses Veridian. The Foundation said counterparties can check an agent's identity before making a payment, while its credential can be revoked if the agent is compromised.

In an Aug. 20 report on AI agent infrastructure, The Graph described identity, access to reliable data, and payment tools as three requirements for autonomous blockchain activity.

According to The Graph's underlying Aug. 18 publication, the ERC-8004 agent standard uses separate registries for identity, reputation, and validation. Paired with account abstraction, The Graph said, the system can support defined permissions, such as a fixed daily trading limit, without giving an agent unrestricted control over a user's funds.